The WordPress Website Discovery Guide
Recommended Resources
Welcome!
If you are here you are probably visiting to this resource page mentioned in Discovery Part 4: Research Your Website Options from my book, “The WordPress Website Discovery Guide: 7 Steps to Easily Plan a Site that Works for You”.
Just like the equipment and supplies you take with you on a grand outdoor adventure, there are certain tools and resources you need to have ready to establish your online platform.
The following is a list of service providers for your website.
Essential #1: Your Website Address
Remember! Not all domain registrars are the same, refer back to Discovery Part 4 for what to look for in a domain registrar.
I tend to be a domain collector (working on that…), and currently, I use, Namecheap for my domains. For my clients I have also used Hover and NameCheap and found them to be easy to be priced competitively, offer a wide range of domain services, and have control panels that are fairly easy to navigate and use.
Essential #2: Website Hosting
A great website hosting partner cannot and should not be selected by price alone. The ole’ saying, “you get what you pay for”, often applies to website hosting. Check the list of what to look for in a webhost in Discovery Step 4.
Currently, I use SiteGround for this website and my hobby websites. A growing number of my clients come to me using WP Engine, and I find I’m becoming a fan of their tech support and active security monitoring.
Website Tools – Additional Resources
A newsletter and autoresponder service partner are essential to your marketing success. You will ALWAYS wish you had started building your list earlier than you did. I can promise you that.
There are a lot of options and opinions out there on what is best. Here is my recommendation. If you are just starting out, do not have a firm marketing plan in place, or are on a limited budget, MailerLite is great to start with.
Now that I have a better marketing plan in place, I needed advanced features that are easy to manage like segmentation and automation. Both of which MailerLite and Convert Kit make it SO much easier for my brain to understand and create. I’m a fan.
When considering what eCommerce solution is the best fit for you, refer to Discovery Part 4 with a list of questions to review. And I’ll add one more thing here – managing the techie bits of eCommerce – do you want to even handle or host the technical bits and pieces of a shopping cart on your site?
Yes? Perfect, use the list below ranging from super simple to fully integrated with shopping carts, CRMs, and marketing campaigns.
No? No problem, take a look at the 3rd Party options listed below.
Full-Service Shopping carts are a bit of a hybrid and offer many options. You can create buy links that you can add to your site but some also offer the option to create a storefront on their server so you can manage, orders, customers, downloads, communication, etc. through them instead of through your website.